Blue Coat acquires Packeteer in $268 million deal

Blue Coat Systems, the leader in WAN Application Delivery, today announced the finalising of an acquisition deal with Packeteer, a market leader in WAN optimisation and traffic prioritisation.

With Blue Coat paying $7.10 per share the final cost of purchasing Packeteer has come to $268 million. The move will also see Blue Coat gaining an additional 50 sales teams and over 1,400 channel partners.

Specific reasons for the move named by Blue Coat include additional revenue, expansion of Blue Coat sales opportunities through existing Packeteer customers, extended leadership for Blue Coat in the WAN optimisation market and incorporation of Packeteer technology into Blue Coat appliances.

The technology that Blue Coat is referring to enables the identification of specific applications over any WAN, something Blue Coat claim will enrich their existing application intelligence technology.

Meanwhile Dave Côté, president and chief executive officer of Packeteer, said: “We believe our customers and channel partners all benefit from this move which results in having a more comprehensive solution for solving the application delivery challenges through advanced application discovery and the intelligent prioritization, security and control of business traffic across the WAN.”